The Earth's ecosystem is a play of complex interrelationships in which humans, plants and animals can contribute to the preservation of the planet in terms of climate protection. According to new findings, even penguins, as a crucial part of the South Pole ecosystem, contribute to the fight against climate change. They support the carbon cycle and air pollutant sequestration.
In the fight against climate change and the corresponding political decisions, it is often a matter of actively preventing and reducing emissions and greenhouse gases, as well as initiating and implementing a green turn in parallel. At the same time, however, it is also important to keep an eye on the planet's poles. Because in order to counteract global warming, these also play an important role in their function as "natural carbon reservoirs" - and with them, the entire ecosystem of the South Pole, right down to penguins.
The importance of iron in the nutrient-rich, chlorophyll-poor regions of the Southern Ocean has long been known to scientists. The metal promotes the growth of phytoplankton, namely the plant-like plankton on the water surface, and thus increases the sequestration of carbon from the atmosphere. For photosynthesis, like trees on land, this takes CO2 out of the air - leading to a reduction in air pollution from the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. In other words, plankton, for example when it settles on the seabed at the end of its life cycle, acts as a natural CO2 store and contributes directly to slowing down the global warming processes responsible for climate change.
Only recently, however, has a group of Spanish researchers discovered how important the presence of southern polar animals, especially penguins, is for iron and the related functioning of the carbon cycle. Observing chinstrap penguin colonies in Antarctica, they found that penguins recycle tonnes of iron every year and that this - ingested by eating plankton-eating krill - is then dispersed in guano. For iron to promote the growth of plant plankton, it must first reach the surface of the Antarctic polar sea. This is exactly where penguins play their role in the fight against climate change. The iron-rich penguin droppings fertilise the water and thus support the natural system of carbon sequestration by phytoplankton - and consequently weaken the global warming phenomenon.
It is therefore essential to preserve the natural habitats of penguins and other animals in Antarctica. Especially when the penguin population has been declining sharply for years due to ice melt. Environmental zones, for example, could lead to a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. This, in turn, would help to maintain living conditions in the Antarctic and other sensitive ecosystems - and maintain the important role of penguins and other animals in the natural carbon cycle and climate protection. It is therefore all the more important that policy not only focuses on actively reducing air pollution, but also supports natural cycles that themselves contribute significantly to environmental protection. This could be the key in the fight against climate change.